.NET 3.5 (SP1 Beta) Entity Framework Test Drive

I'm giving the Entity Framework (EF) a test drive on the shortBet project. My primary reason for giving it a go was centered around the fact that I work primarily with Oracle database server on the backend and LINQ to SQL (L2S) is not a good fit for me. shortBet will be using SQL Server, so it serves as an excellent platform for this test drive.

Despite LINQ's greatness, I haven't been all that interested in L2S which has several nasty weaknesses. First, typical LINQ coding elegance falls down on its face when faced with joining more than a few queryables that are closely bound to relational views and tables. Second it generates SQL command text automagically, and I'm not intrinsically happy with that. Finally, and most significantly, use of L2S is bound to the SQL Server platform for the forseeable future.

The EF is an interesting tidbit I had heard was a better deal than the L2S way from a variety of .NET and Oracle resources I trust for leading edge information. After my test drive so far, my assertion is that it is and it isn't a better deal than L2S. It is, because queryables in the EF have a greater potential for expressing complexity and thus more elegant LINQ statements than using L2S queryables. It is, because the tools for expressing Entity Data Models (EDM) are fairly slick and effective. It isn't, because as far as I can fathom from my little dip in the pool, EF is utterly dependent upon L2S - unless you want to write your own custom Data Access Layer, which eliminating is one of the pillars of the EF. By using the EF, at best I'm out of the logical fire, but I'm still in the physical frying pan. It isn't, because even though I have a highly functional relational model for my Shortbet application - I can't seem to see how I would effectively express it with an EDM.

Part of that last failing is clearly because I'm a relational guy, and I'm not very good at OOP modeling. Partly it's because I believe (in my heart of hearts) that entity modeling is simply inferior.

So, at this point - although I'm still continuing with the EF test drive (thankfully I have some help) - I'm of the mindset right now that rich and meaningful entities are great - but a unified model of more than a child-sized handful of them is an irrational endeavor.